Fences Archives - Direct Drives & Patios

As part of many landscaping, driveways and patio projects, brickwork is an important add on.

Choosing the right kind of brickwork provider is important for a new build or renovation. However, many people make the mistake of choosing an inexperienced or cheaper bricklayer. Understandably, this can bring more than it’s fair share of issues.

Brickwork is one part of the home where compromising on quality isn’t acceptable. Structures which are made with shoddy brickwork may be weaker, unstable or not aesthetically attractive. Doing repair jobs or renovations for period buildings especially need proper repairs.

Bad brickwork will do a lot of harm, and often isn’t worth cutting costs. However, what are the considerations for bricklayers? How do you choose a professional or company that is right for your needs? Well, not to worry, because we’ll be looking at some of the things to judge providers by.

How Do They Operate?

The first and arguably most important consideration for a bricklayer is how they choose to operate. How do they approach jobs?

Ultimately, this does impact how long a job will take to complete, how well it is done, and the overall costs. In an ideal setting, your brickwork team will be a three-person unit. This is the most efficient option in the industry!

The unit is made up of two trained, capable bricklayers and a general labourer. The labourer will have the job of keeping the bricklayers with a steady supply of bricks, mortar and blocks. If they do their job correctly, then the bricklayers can focus on the important stuff – laying and finishing the brickwork properly.

How Long Does the Project Take?

Each project that you need to undertake has a specific timeframe to complete. It will vary from one task to the next, but it does play an important role in choosing a bricklayer and company for your needs.

If the weather conditions are favourable, then an efficient brickwork team can lay an average of 1200 bricks every day. However, it’s important to understand that there are many things which will influence the speed at which a bricklaying team can work.

Things like the type of wall that you want to create, the type of pointing involved, the brick bond, as well as openings and lintels can all cause delays to the project. These are not problems so much as challenges which require a proper solution to solve. After all, you want a bricklaying team to work out effective, safe solutions.

What Specs Do You Have?

Understanding what specifications you have is a good way to make sure that you inform the bricklaying team of your needs.

You need to have detailed specifications where you can, because this makes sure that they know exactly what you need regarding work. Furthermore, it helps to remove any delays in the project because they know exactly what needs to be done.

Checking Their Credentials

You need to make sure that you check the credentials of any bricklaying team that you need to work with. It would be a disaster if you hired a company, they arrived to complete the work, and immediately began acting in an unprofessional manner.

Thankfully, this is the Internet and modern methods of credential checking exist. Look for testimonials from other past customers, use websites like TrustPilot and Check-A-Trade, and you will be able to make smart decisions regarding the companies that you choose to work with.

Customer Service

Customer service is a vital part of any successful trade company, so it’s worth ringing and asking a bricklaying team about the kind of services they provide. The answers that you receive are important, but what is more important is the quality of the service that you get.

The right professionals will be polite, courteous, knowledgeable, and more than happy to explain things to you. you will definitely get a sense that they are happy to help, which makes a lot of difference.

Flexibility

Look, you are probably a person with a busy life. There’s a lot of things that you need to do with your time, and it’s important that you can arrange for people to come and perform a job at a time that is convenient to you.

A good way to work out which companies are going to be worth collaborating with is how flexible they are prepared to be. Flexibility is a key characteristic that we look for in tradespeople, and it is no different for bricklayers. The right bunch of professionals would be more than happy to arrange to come when it is convenient for you, not the other way around.

Choosing the right brickwork company is obviously an important thing. This is a project that you clearly have an investment in, whether it is a renovation, an existing repair job, or a new build. For that reason, you have to be quite ruthless when choosing a company, and hold people to the highest standards.

The best thing for you in this situation is to shop around. You need to try and look at the different kinds of professionals that are available and work with them to find the best results. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, and to come away from a company if they don’t meet your expectations.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with being ruthless when searching for a provider. Brickwork is one area where you can not afford to compromise. Further compounding the problem is the fact that when it comes to tradespeople, for every qualified expert there are several amateurs of dubious quality. These are, naturally, people you should avoid.

We provide brickwork services. We would be happy to help, and we love listening to people to get a proper understanding of their needs. We know how important it is to make the right decisions, so we are happy to talk to you about things. Don’t hesitate to get in touch with us, and we will find out exactly what we can do. We’re here to help you.

Wooden fencing is a common sight in most homes and it’s not difficult to see why this is the case. The thing you have to consider with a lot of wooden fencing is that taking care of it, and looking after it can be a challenge. As a leading garden fence installation company, here are some tips on ensuring you look after your garden fencing so you won’t have to pay expensive replacement costs.

It’s not the easiest thing to do but there are things you can do to make it work out a bit more. What we thought we would do is take a look at how to look after wooden fencing. With the right tools and a bit of thought, it’s possible to do a lot of things.

Get the Right Equipment For the Job

Obviously, if you want to be able to get the best results when it comes to your wooden fencing and regular maintenance, you need the right equipment for the job.

Wooden fencing is a great resource, but there are certain things you need to think about if you want to be able to take care of it properly.

This means you need things like a hose, a pressure washer, wooden stain, a cloth, and other tools to keep the wood in tip-top condition. Making sure that you have the right tools for the job is a good way to deal with things.

Watch out for Plants and Your Garden

Performing basic fence maintenance is something that people do all the time, but if you are going to do this, you need to make sure that you are protecting your plants and other parts of your garden from harm. It’s important to try and be sensible about how you do things, especially if you are working with cleaning chemicals or a hose.

Take your time with basic fence maintenance, and don’t try and rush out.

It’s important to make sure that you get a thorough job done, but at the same time, you don’t want to damage anything unnecessarily.

Bleach First, Power Wash Second

When it comes to having the right cleaner for wooden fencing, you can buy a premade mixture in your local garden store, alternatively you can create your own using bleach and water. The objective is to water down the bleach so it doesn’t destroy the world, but it’s still strong enough that you can clean with it. Achieving the balance is delicate, but it’s well worth it in the end.

Apply the cleaning solution to the fencing first, and give it a good scrub. Try and particularly focus on any of the problem areas that you can see, and then you take the hose off the pressure washer and then blast it clean.

Let Your Wood Dry Out Properly

Now, obviously, after-care is an important part of owning a wooden fence. You want to make sure that you look after it in the right way, so you need to make sure that you apply the things like the varnish and the polish, but you need to wait for the wood to dry. The last thing that you want to do is accidentally locking moisture, because this will weaken the wood over time.

Instead, your best bet is to take a look at waiting until the word has dried before you start applying things, and just to go slowly. Ideally, you want to get a nice, even, consistent coat of varnish and polish across the world.

Consistency

Consistency is one of the hardest things to do when it comes to basic wooden fence care, but it takes not that long to perform this kind of task and it can have a big impact. Consistency needs to be what you work on.

It’s important to realise that when it comes to things like wooden fencing, they will benefit from you taking the time to do this on a regular basis. If you want to extend the lifespan of your fencing beyond what you think it can physically do, then you need to put the maximum effort into taking care of it.

Replace As Necessary

When we think about wooden fencing, ultimately, we do have to be somewhat pragmatic about it, and recognise that eventually, the wood will become too damaged to use. There is only so much you can do in terms of maintenance and basic care, before the natural lifespan of the word begins to run out and the material begins to break down.

This is perfectly normal when it happens, and the best thing that you can do in this situation is to just replace the wood with a new panel or new piece of fencing and move on. Damaged wood fencing is a waste of time and resources, so there’s no point trying to maintain it when it has reached the limit.

Final Thoughts

When it comes to wooden fencing, you have a responsibility to try and keep it in the best possible condition.

This will pay dividends later on when your fencing continues to look good and as a practical job for a long period of time.

However, like most things, the fencing will only continue to be suitable for long-term usage if you put the time in to keep it in the best condition. This is where a lot of people fall down, because basic maintenance is hard to do.

Your best bet will often be to try and focus on regular maintenance, at least once a year. The summer months are probably the best time to be doing this, because the wood will dry quickly and that means you can get through the task with more time to spare. Furthermore, it’s well worth strengthening the fencing in the summer to protect it during the winter when the weather is more unpredictable and prone to extremes.

Fencing maintenance is just a normal part of owning property. It can be quite annoying sometimes, but it’s worth it to get the hang of. If you take the time to experiment with what’s available, you’ll see that you have plenty of different results.

The Top Considerations For a Brickwork Provider

How Do They Operate?

How Long Does the Project Take?

What Specs Do You Have?

Checking Their Credentials

Customer Service

Flexibility

How to Look After Wooden Fencing

Get the Right Equipment For the Job

Watch out for Plants and Your Garden

Bleach First, Power Wash Second

Let Your Wood Dry Out Properly

Consistency

Replace As Necessary

Final Thoughts

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